by Jeffrey Martin, USA TODAY Sports

by Jeffrey Martin, USA TODAY Sports

PORTLAND, Ore. -- Erik Spoelstra has the Miami Heat aiming for a third consecutive appearance in the NBA Finals, but it was a life-altering decision nearly 20 years ago that set him on this path.

In 1995, Spoelstra had his choice of two job offers, and family seemingly on both sides of the fence.

His father, Jon, a former executive with the Portland Trail Blazers, Denver Nuggets and New Jersey Nets, remembers both opportunities holding appeal. Erik, his only son and the younger of two children, could continue playing basketball professionally in Germany or he could accept a position with the Miami Heat as a video coordinator.

There was a catch with the NBA gig.

"It wasn't a guarantee that it would last past the summer," Spoelstra told USA TODAY Sports. "I was not set on that. It was probably the toughest decision I had made in my life, because I just had an opportunity in Germany for another two-year deal.

"I was living the dream over there."

Nursing a cup of coffee on an overcast afternoon in Spoelstra's hometown recently, Jon Spoelstra laughed. To him, it would have been an easy call - "You get to play basketball, you're being paid and you get to drink all of this beer?" - but it was Erik's decision.

To his then-24-year-old son, who'd been rejected repeatedly for college assistant coaching gigs, extending his playing career felt more important than landing that elusive first job off the court.

That is, until Erik's older sister, Monica, spoke up.

"I don't know if these are the right words," Jon Spoelstra said, "but she said, 'What the (expletive) are you thinking? Do you realize how difficult it is to get into the NBA?

"Just because Dad is there doesn't mean it's easy. To get a job on the basketball side? You have to be an idiot.'

"He called me back a day later and said, 'I changed my mind.'"

Erik Spoelstra has been in South Beach ever since, ascending from poring over video to scout to director of scouting to assistant coach and, finally, to head coach in 2008.

In four years, he has led the Heat to the NBA Finals twice and won the championship last season. They are the overwhelming favorites to repeat and steamrolled to the second-longest winning streak in league history, a 27-game run broken by the Chicago Bulls on March 27. The Heat are up 3-1 on the Bulls in the Eastern Conference semifinals, which are headed to Game 5 in Miami today.

It's an impressive run often attributed more to the unquestioned greatness of LeBron James and Dwyane Wade than Spoelstra's sideline acumen.

"I think it's amazing how the media drives perception vs. results driving perception," former NBA coach and current ESPN analyst Jeff Van Gundy told USA TODAY Sports. "He's at the top of the list for blame but at the bottom for credit. I guarantee the people that coach against him absolutely recognize just how great of a coach he is.

"He never draws attention to himself. But to overlook what he's done - when it's all said and done, this guy is going to be a Hall of Fame coach."

Unlikely route

It's all hard for Jon Spoelstra to fathom - his son's rise to the top of his profession was not part of some master plan.

"I never tried to steer him into any industry," he says. "Now, maybe if I was a lawyer ... "

Erik went to Jesuit High in nearby Beaverton, where he started playing as a 98-pound freshman guard, undersized because he, like his sister and his father, was intentionally a year young for his grade.

"It either gives you a tremendous advantage or you just get crushed by it," Jon Spoelstra said.

A year later, Erik attended all 41 of the Trail Blazers' home games. Looking back, he said recently, he admired how then-Portland coach Rick Adelman balanced work and family, which was his father's point in the exercise.

It was a bonding experience.

"There was no ulterior motive," Jon Spoelstra says. "It wasn't because I thought he was going to be an NBA coach or player.

"I would think if I was a plumber, I'd have my little boy following me around and I'd show him what a wrench does."

One of his son's favorite players was guard Terry Porter, which was why Erik wore No. 30 in high school and later at the University of Portland, where he was named West Coast Conference Freshman of the Year in 1989 and his 488 assists still ranks third on the school's career list.

Former UP coach Larry Steele remembers Spoelstra as a heady player, though he's not sure he'd thought much of coaching at the time.

"If I look at college players as a whole, it's hard to project that a player will be a coach," Steele said. "But if I was picking players that had the possibility with the desire to be a coach, Erik would have been one.

"But did he want to be a coach? I'm not sure he did. But he loved the game so much, it happened for him."

That theme has lived on through the exhausted narrative of Spoelstra's humble start in the Heat's video "cave" - "I find it boring," Jon Spoelstra says - but his attention to detail manifested itself long before.

When Spoelstra was in high school, his coach challenged the team to take 30,000 three-point jump shots during the summer. Spoelstra figured if he took 500 every day, he'd be fine. He did just that, detailing makes and misses in a daily chart.

He was the only one who completed the challenge.

Or there were times when Jon Spoelstra would bring home promotional highlight videos of other players the Trail Blazers would air at halftime of games. Erik, a teenager at the time, was obsessed with the Detroit Pistons' Isiah Thomas and his crossover dribble. Using a VCR that had a scroll to control the frame, Erik would slow down or speed up the film and then race outside to mimic what he'd just seen.

"You see, working hard isn't difficult," Jon Spoelstra said. "And you have a tremendous advantage - if you don't have the skill set as great as your contemporaries, you can outwork them. Now, you might not be able to become a LeBron James on the basketball court, but in other areas you can outwork people and be better."

'Hell of a coach'

As for coaching a LeBron James, there was no manual for that, though Heat President Pat Riley recommended several books, including his own.

The critics were ready, wondering if Spoelstra's boyish looks - at 42, he could pass for younger - and inexperience, along with his atypical background for an NBA coach, would be his undoing.

"There is a natural bias against guys who didn't play (in the NBA) that they're not deserving of the opportunity to coach great players," Van Gundy says. "I'm not sure what the other biases are, but he treats everyone with respect without using any shtick.

"I have no idea. All I know is he's a hell of a coach."

Van Gundy served on Riley's staff with the New York Knicks from 1991 until 1995, which is when Riley joined the Heat. Van Gundy coached Patrick Ewing, Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady, all of whom were regarded among the best in the NBA at some point.

He notes Spoelstra has won 65 percent of the games he has coached, which includes the first two seasons in Miami when James was still with the Cleveland Cavaliers. So if the skeptics are quick to credit James' arrival for Spoelstra's success, Van Gundy argues they also must dock Red Auerbach, Phil Jackson and even Riley because they all had plenty of Hall of Famers on their teams.

Incidentally, Jackson (one time) and Riley (three times) have won the NBA Coach of the Year award, which is named after Auerbach.

Van Gundy says Spoelstra, who'd rather fantasize about all of that German beer instead of winning one of the league's elite awards, should be next.

He was runner-up this year to Denver's George Karl.

"The guy has studied NBA basketball for nearly 20 years now," Van Gundy said. "He knows that organization extremely well, knows what's expected and he does his job as well as anyone in the NBA.

"He's not looking for credit because at his roots he's an extremely humble man, but it's time that people who drive perception to recognize how good this guy is."